How an internet meme became a Trump campaign slogan

[DonViejo]

The creator of 'Dilbert,' a Reddit user and Newt Gingrich all helped to make a random tweet part of Trump's midterm stump speech.

By BEN SCHRECKINGER 10/31/2018 05:05 AM EDT

It used to take a fancy degree and political connections to become a presidential speechwriter. In the era of President Donald Trump, all you need is a tweet.

On a Thursday morning earlier this month, a Twitter user in Georgia with 500 followers responded to a video of Trump touting the economy and denouncing Democrats by tweeting the hashtag “#JobsNotMobs.” The next day, Scott Adams, the pro-Trump creator of the comic strip “Dilbert,” who has nearly 300,000 followers, endorsed this catchy framing in a tweet of his own. The hashtag took off from there, as Trump supporters on Reddit turned it into a visual internet meme, with images of auto workers set against leftist antifa protesters. Even former House Speaker and Trump confidant Newt Gingrich tweeted in praise of the concept, calling it “a nice, clean formula.”

Within a week, Trump had begun incorporating a variation of the concept — “Democrats produce mobs, Republicans produce jobs” — into his stump speech, and his campaign began printing up signs to distribute at rallies with the slogan “Jobs vs. Mobs.”

The line’s journey from a stray thought on social media to the heart of Trump’s closing midterms argument offers a case study in the free-wheeling approach to messaging that has enabled the brander-in-chief to thrive in a fast-moving information environment even while relying less than his recent predecessors did on consultants, focus groups and other tools of modern political messaging.

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https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/31/trump-jobs-not-mobs-slogan-origin-twitter-reddit-949718

[mr_lebowski]

1. Very disappointed to hear Scott Adams is pro-Trump ...

I used to love Dilbert.

Now I f***ing hate it.

SAD!

[Dave Starsky]

2. You didn't know that?

He's been off the rails for a long time. At least since 9/11.

[mr_lebowski]

3. I'm afraid I never heard that ... for reals ... not super-into 'comic strip authors' ...

Or if I did, I fried that brain cell somewhere along the way

[Sneederbunk]

4. Old enough to remember Al Capp.